Ten Thousand Things

An incomparable look at how Chinese artists have used mass production to assemble exquisite objects from standardized parts

Chinese workers in the third century BCE created seven thousand life-sized terracotta soldiers to guard the tomb of the First Emperor. In the eleventh century CE, Chinese builders constructed a pagoda from as many as thirty thousand separately carved wooden pieces. As these examples show, throughout history, Chinese artisans have produced works of art in astonishing quantities, and have done so without sacrificing quality, affordability, or speed of manufacture. In this book, Lothar Ledderose takes us on a remarkable tour of Chinese art and culture to explain how artists used complex systems of mass production to assemble extraordinary objects from standardized parts or modules. He reveals how these systems have deep roots in Chinese thought and reflect characteristically Chinese modes of social organization. Combining invaluable aesthetic and cultural insights with a rich variety of illustrations, Ten Thousand Things make a profound statement about Chinese art and society.

"While the idea that traditional China can be defined by its production processes is not entirely new, only with Lothar Ledderose's Ten Thousand Things has that argument been made comprehensively, and in terms that fully engage the social and art historian . . . An excellent resource for the social and art history of China."---James A. Flath, Pacific Affairs

"[A] stimulating and provocative overview of the theme of creativity in Chinese art . . . This may be a book with a large and ambitious thesis, but it is also one very firmly grounded in specifics . . . illustrated with a richness and aptness which is rarely seen today . . . The clarity of exposition and the liveliness of the language makes each of the eight linked essays a pleasure to read on its own . . . The work deserves a wide readership."---Craig Clunas, Burlington Magazine

"A truly unique book to clarify the mind about what Chinese art is now and what it was."

"Winner of the 2002 Joseph Levenson Book Prize for pre-1999 China"